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Tuesday, February 20, 2018

My Thirtieth Birthday Celebration -- The Truth

My oldest son is convinced that I am not honest with my blog readers about what I'm really like. He says that people who read my blog think I'm a certain way, never ever spending money on things that aren't absolutely necessary, that I always eat healthily, and that isn't true. He dared me to post here and tell you the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth... about the real me, and how I celebrated my 30th birthday.

This wasn't my most frugal birthday celebration. Nor was it paleo. Or particularly healthy. Or other things that you would associate with me, Penny Price. But I had fun. And I wanted to do something special, because thirty is a "big" birthday, one I'd originally planned to celebrate by going abroad to Cyprus with my friend, but those plans got nixed. I didn't want to just do something really small and insignificant to celebrate such a big birthday, so yes, I spent money. But I had a great time. And the money spent was well worth it.

What made things harder to celebrate (and honestly, makes life harder in general) is that my husband works overnight every night, and is out of the house 14 hours a day and needs to sleep during the day, making it hard to find a time that I can go out, because I need to be at home at night with the children, or find a babysitter, which makes things more stressful not to mention expensive.

On Wednesday, my father took my husband and myself out for our birthdays to an all you can eat Brazilian meat restaurant, where he treated us. It was amazing and delicious and a great way to kick off our birthday weekend. My husband and I, as I've mentioned in the past, share a birthday- he turned 32 this year and I turned 30 on February 18.

On Thursday, I went out with a friend to a restaurant in the nearby large city. Originally I had planned on a large get together with a bunch of close friends, but because of timing and various other things, one friend after another after another needed to cancel. In the end I just ended up having brunch with one friend, but it was still great fun; she traveled in from a rather far city just to see me, so that was really special. Usually when I go out, it's hard for me to order things because even things you'd think would be gluten free end up being fried in the same oil as gluten items, but luckily, because we were out so early in the morning, it was brand new oil in the deep fryer and I was able to have these amazing sweet and spicy dairy home fries that I usually wouldn't be able to order because of the gluten issue.

On Sunday, my husband slept when he came home from work in the morning, and then cut his sleep short to be able to go out on a date with me before work. We went out to a terrific Asian restaurant with a lot of gluten free items on the menu clearly marked, which made ordering such a cinch! I had tom yum soup and a spicy red curry based chicken and veggie stir fry with rice, as well as a cocktail. My husband had sweet and sour chicken and orange juice. Even with all that, our meal was under 50 bucks, so that was awesome. (I was going to order more rice to have with my meal, because it ended up being too spicy for me, but the restaurant gave me another serving of rice on the house. Woohoo!) After that, we went to a movie- we were debating between a few and ended up seeing 12 Strong, which was a really amazing movie about American soldiers fighting the Taliban in Afghanistan after 9-11. It was an awesome date and we had a terrific time, and because it was during the day, we didn't need to get a babysitter.

Yesterday I had the last of my birthday celebrations. Because going out is hard because of my husband's work schedule and the kids, I decided to celebrate at home with a bunch of friends. I considered cooking up a bunch of different types of foods to impress my friends, but in the end decided that it was my birthday and I'd do it how I want, and take it easy, and use pretty much only store bought food. I bought a few bubbly alcoholic drink mixes (called mojito mixes for some reason) on sale, in various flavors. I also bought some wine on sale, as well as vodka. I got some fruit juices, price comparing to see which was cheapest, and had a make your own cocktail or drink type thing. I also bought chips and onion rings and tortilla chips and mint chocolate (all on sale) and at first that was going to be all... but then I said that I wanted a birthday cake so I made myself a gluten free egg free chocolate cake and covered it with sprinkles.
And then I decided on a whim that I wanted macaroni and cheese even if its a random thing to serve at a birthday party with all the rest of the junk. I only do well with certain cheeses and don't do well with regular milk, so I made the mac and cheese using gluten free pasta, soy milk, cheddar cheese, and Parmesan cheese, and it was delicious and a hit! I planned on ice cream as well, but silly me, I forgot to take it out of the freezer.
I was considering a game or something, but in the end we just had such a great time talking and laughing and having fun that we didn't need the game that I borrowed from a friend. We started at 9 pm (and fortunately my kids cooperated and went to sleep early) and continued until past 11 pm. It was mostly local friends from my neighborhood, but one close friend came in from another city so that was just super awesome and made me feel loved.
For me, the best way to celebrate anything is with my friends. And I'm fortunate that I have a really awesome group of friends to do that with.
And I honestly didn't add up the cost. But I'm pretty sure that the overall cost wasn't too high, and was probably about the same as it would have been going out to a restaurant with them, but just much more fun and convenient.

All in all, I had a really great birthday, and I was glad to start off my 30s with such a bang. And no, I didn't feel sad about not celebrating in Cyprus. I had a great birthday at home. Even if it wasn't quite so frugal or quite so Paleo.

I love that your loved ones, especially your husband, took the extra effort to make your birthday special. I get incredibly touched when people give up their time to celebrate with me, presents and other material items don't matter nearly as much! Happy birthday.

Ok, lol, sorry...my 5th grade English teacher (45 years ago!) is in my head: "I didn't spend nothing." Written out without contraction: I did NOT spend nothing = I spent something. God bless you, Mr. Fit! Wacky, silly teacher, used great visuals as well. Not to detract from your very awesome post!

I think you're actually incorrect. If I'd intended to say "I didn't spend nothing" meaning "I didn't spend anything" then that would have been bad grammar, but as my intention was to say that unlike the nothing people would assume I'd spend, I actually didnt spend that "nothing", I spent money. If you want to show me where in the grammatical rulebooks it would prove that what I said is incorrect, go right ahead. But I maintain I said that correctly.

Technically, yes, the double negative creates a positive. But that doesn't mean you should always use it, especially in written text where it can make the meaning unclear. That sentence was very awkwardly written. I wasn't the only one who was confused at first. The fact that this is a frugal blog added to the confusion, as the readers understandably thought you were trying to say that you didn't spend any money.

Didn't you always say there is no point in being super frugal if you never do anything with the money you save? The point of scrimping elsewhere is to to able to have money to spend on other things.At least thats what I learned from this blog. We are very frugal but reading your blog for the last few years helps me not feel guilty to buy some luxuries that make me happy.

Please tell your son that this reader has never been under the illusion that you only eat healthy and never spend any money. :-) It's pretty obvious to me that you enjoy the occasional food or monetary splurge.

We celebrated a special day yesterday! The anniversary of our adopting our oldest son. We went to one of our favorite restaurants and enjoyed a nice dinner. My husband recently became unemployed but we have been scrimping and saving where we can because we wanted to be able to go out for this special day. Hopefully my husband will get a job soon, but we are fairly prepared for a few months if need be.

My husband and I went out for a night of drinks and dancing on the weekend and out to dinner the actual night of my birthday. It is not so much the presents, but the experiences that we remember on our birthdays as we get older.

Happy Birthday to you both. Glad ya'll had a great time. In my house birthdays are spent the way you want. For years I've parked myself in front of my pc to play my favorite online games without disruption. Now, I feel a need to branch out and maybe have an adventure. Love your blog, I feel your sharing what we need and not giving us what we don't. Keep up the great work.

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Hello there! I'm Penny, author of Penniless Foodie in the Wild, an adaptable cookbook for frugal people like myself who like to eat great food. I'm a mom of four who loves to blog about how to have the best life possible while living on a relatively low income. We're a "crunchy", gluten-free family, homeschooling, homebirthing, autism, natural parenting family.I'm always happy to receive emails from readers at pennilessparenting@yahoo.com.

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